What is a Fact?

Should you think about your duty, or about the consequences of your actions? Or should you concentrate on becoming a good person?

Moderators: AMod, iMod

Skepdick
Posts: 14366
Joined: Fri Jun 14, 2019 11:16 am

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Skepdick »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 10:35 am just as we don't have any linguistic means to discuss mutually exclusive facts that are both 50% correct
Of course you do! Your framework of "correctness" with respect to which each fact is only 50% so.

If it is computable, then there is always a fixed point - even relativists agree on the speed of light.
User avatar
FlashDangerpants
Posts: 6268
Joined: Mon Jan 04, 2016 11:54 pm

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by FlashDangerpants »

Skepdick wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 10:44 am
FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 10:35 am just as we don't have any linguistic means to discuss mutually exclusive facts that are both 50% correct
Of course you do! Your framework of "correctness" with respect to which each fact is only 50% so.

If it is computable, then there is always a fixed point - even relativists agree on the speed of light.
Mutually exclusive.
Skepdick
Posts: 14366
Joined: Fri Jun 14, 2019 11:16 am

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Skepdick »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:08 am Mutually exclusive.
If they are observed they can't possibly be "mutually exclusive" now, can they?

You are just failing at reconciliation.
User avatar
FlashDangerpants
Posts: 6268
Joined: Mon Jan 04, 2016 11:54 pm

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by FlashDangerpants »

Skepdick wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:10 am
FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:08 am Mutually exclusive.
If they are observed they can't possibly be "mutually exclusive" now, can they?

You are just failing at reconciliation.
Ok, so in Veritas's thing ... If one religion postulates that the world was created in 7 days, and some specific thing happens on the fith day while some other preceeds it on the fourth. That's been deemed a falsehood so it is only 3.55578% true according to whatever fun method is used to arrive at these highly convincing numbers.

A different religion claims the world was made all in one instant by 70 zillion fairies farting. For this religion we arrive at a falseness score of 7.8% true because the number is calculated randomly.

Eventually, after running through an arbitrary number of religious beliefs, all deemed absurd and false by somebody who claims no exclusive knowledge, and thus each have an arbitrary, cosmetically low probability, we end up at the scientific explanation with the big bang followed by the stuff that comes after that. There is 17% probability left over once all the other religions are taken into account.

Now it just so happens that according to the fossil record and the manner in which organisms are deemed to have evolved, the scientific consensus is that the event on the fifth day of that 7 days religion cannot be preceeded by that event on the fourth, and thus these competing explanations are mutually exclusive. And if the world were the instant creation of fairy butts, then this seems to exclude the possibility that the thing that came before the other thing could have done so or needed to to have done so irrespective of the explanation.

Mister Veritas seems to want it to be untrue that all of those explanations are simultaneously true. You, meh, not so much. But that's fine, the trap for Veritas here is that he runs the risk of becoming you, which seems an undesirable outcome. You of course, as always don't give a fuck about the subject under discussion because everything is just a means for you to excercise your obsessions.
Skepdick
Posts: 14366
Joined: Fri Jun 14, 2019 11:16 am

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Skepdick »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:35 am
Skepdick wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:10 am
FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:08 am Mutually exclusive.
If they are observed they can't possibly be "mutually exclusive" now, can they?

You are just failing at reconciliation.
Ok, so in Veritas's thing ... If one religion postulates that the world was created in 7 days, and some specific thing happens on the fith day while some other preceeds it on the fourth. That's been deemed a falsehood so it is only 3.55578% true according to whatever fun method is used to arrive at these highly convincing numbers.

A different religion claims the world was made all in one instant by 70 zillion fairies farting. For this religion we arrive at a falseness score of 7.8% true because the number is calculated randomly.

Eventually, after running through an arbitrary number of religious beliefs, all deemed absurd and false by somebody who claims no exclusive knowledge, and thus each have an arbitrary, cosmetically low probability, we end up at the scientific explanation with the big bang followed by the stuff that comes after that. There is 17% probability left over once all the other religions are taken into account.

Now it just so happens that according to the fossil record and the manner in which organisms are deemed to have evolved, the scientific consensus is that the event on the fifth day of that 7 days religion cannot be preceeded by that event on the fourth, and thus these competing explanations are mutually exclusive. And if the world were the instant creation of fairy butts, then this seems to exclude the possibility that the thing that came before the other thing could have done so or needed to to have done so irrespective of the explanation.

Mister Veritas seems to want it to be untrue that all of those explanations are simultaneously true. You, meh, not so much. But that's fine, the trap for Veritas here is that he runs the risk of becoming you, which seems an undesirable outcome. You of course, as always don't give a fuck about the subject under discussion because everything is just a means for you to excercise your obsessions.
You understand that postulations (e.g narratives) in any framework happen after analysis. Yes?

Most data scientists know this. You fit the story to the data, not the data to the story.

Do you actually understand that explanatory power is different to predictive power?

And so you have yourself a conundrum with all story-telling. For any finite dataset you can have infinitely many explanations (narratives).
But new data can falsify old explanations. You are obsessing over falsified theories.

You can have a story that explains everything but predicts nothing. That is why Truth doesn't fucking matter - it's fucking useless all on its own.
What difference does it make in practice. None whatsoever! That's why the Omphalos hypothesis (or the 5 minute version) is meant to be seen as ironic/sarcastic.

Here's something to mull over: https://www.stat.berkeley.edu/~aldous/1 ... hmueli.pdf
Veritas Aequitas
Posts: 12373
Joined: Wed Jul 11, 2012 4:41 am

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Veritas Aequitas »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:35 am
Skepdick wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:10 am
FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:08 am Mutually exclusive.
If they are observed they can't possibly be "mutually exclusive" now, can they?

You are just failing at reconciliation.
Ok, so in Veritas's thing ... If one religion postulates that the world was created in 7 days, and some specific thing happens on the fith day while some other preceeds it on the fourth. That's been deemed a falsehood so it is only 3.55578% true according to whatever fun method is used to arrive at these highly convincing numbers.

A different religion claims the world was made all in one instant by 70 zillion fairies farting. For this religion we arrive at a falseness score of 7.8% true because the number is calculated randomly.

Eventually, after running through an arbitrary number of religious beliefs, all deemed absurd and false by somebody who claims no exclusive knowledge, and thus each have an arbitrary, cosmetically low probability, we end up at the scientific explanation with the big bang followed by the stuff that comes after that. There is 17% probability left over once all the other religions are taken into account.

Now it just so happens that according to the fossil record and the manner in which organisms are deemed to have evolved, the scientific consensus is that the event on the fifth day of that 7 days religion cannot be preceeded by that event on the fourth, and thus these competing explanations are mutually exclusive. And if the world were the instant creation of fairy butts, then this seems to exclude the possibility that the thing that came before the other thing could have done so or needed to to have done so irrespective of the explanation.

Mister Veritas seems to want it to be untrue that all of those explanations are simultaneously true. You, meh, not so much. But that's fine, the trap for Veritas here is that he runs the risk of becoming you, which seems an undesirable outcome. You of course, as always don't give a fuck about the subject under discussion because everything is just a means for you to excercise your obsessions.
The above are stupid examples and your strawman.

Note Richard Dawkins scale of belief in God exists.
Dawkins belief God exists with 1/7 probability, i.e. 1/7 truth and 6/7 false.
Personally I will give it ZERO probability.

Spectrum of theistic probability:
In The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins posits that "the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other."
He goes on to propose a continuous "spectrum of probabilities" between two extremes of opposite certainty, which can be represented by seven "milestones". Dawkins suggests definitive statements to summarize one's place along the spectrum of theistic probability. These "milestones" are:[2]

1. Strong theist. 100% probability of God. In the words of Carl Jung: "I do not believe, I know."
2. De facto theist. Very high probability but short of 100%. "I don't know for certain, but I strongly believe in God and live my life on the assumption that he is there."
3. eaning towards theism. Higher than 50% but not very high. "I am very uncertain, but I am inclined to believe in God."
4. Completely impartial. Exactly 50%. "God's existence and non-existence are exactly equiprobable."
5. Leaning towards atheism. Lower than 50% but not very low. "I do not know whether God exists but I'm inclined to be skeptical."
6. De facto atheist. Very low probability, but short of zero. "I don't know for certain but I think God is very improbable, and I live my life on the assumption that he is not there."
7. Strong atheist. "I know there is no God, with the same conviction as Jung knows there is one."

Dawkins argues that while there appear to be plenty of individuals that would place themselves as "1" due to the strictness of religious doctrine against doubt, most atheists do not consider themselves "7" because atheism arises from a lack of evidence and evidence can always change a thinking person's mind.

In print, Dawkins self-identified as a "6", though when interviewed by Bill Maher[3] and later by Anthony Kenny,[4] he suggested "6.9" to be more accurate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_ ... robability
User avatar
FlashDangerpants
Posts: 6268
Joined: Mon Jan 04, 2016 11:54 pm

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by FlashDangerpants »

Veritas Aequitas wrote: Tue Jun 09, 2020 2:50 am
FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:35 am
Skepdick wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:10 am
If they are observed they can't possibly be "mutually exclusive" now, can they?

You are just failing at reconciliation.
Ok, so in Veritas's thing ... If one religion postulates that the world was created in 7 days, and some specific thing happens on the fith day while some other preceeds it on the fourth. That's been deemed a falsehood so it is only 3.55578% true according to whatever fun method is used to arrive at these highly convincing numbers.

A different religion claims the world was made all in one instant by 70 zillion fairies farting. For this religion we arrive at a falseness score of 7.8% true because the number is calculated randomly.

Eventually, after running through an arbitrary number of religious beliefs, all deemed absurd and false by somebody who claims no exclusive knowledge, and thus each have an arbitrary, cosmetically low probability, we end up at the scientific explanation with the big bang followed by the stuff that comes after that. There is 17% probability left over once all the other religions are taken into account.

Now it just so happens that according to the fossil record and the manner in which organisms are deemed to have evolved, the scientific consensus is that the event on the fifth day of that 7 days religion cannot be preceeded by that event on the fourth, and thus these competing explanations are mutually exclusive. And if the world were the instant creation of fairy butts, then this seems to exclude the possibility that the thing that came before the other thing could have done so or needed to to have done so irrespective of the explanation.

Mister Veritas seems to want it to be untrue that all of those explanations are simultaneously true. You, meh, not so much. But that's fine, the trap for Veritas here is that he runs the risk of becoming you, which seems an undesirable outcome. You of course, as always don't give a fuck about the subject under discussion because everything is just a means for you to excercise your obsessions.
The above are stupid examples and your strawman.

Note Richard Dawkins scale of belief in God exists.
Dawkins belief God exists with 1/7 probability, i.e. 1/7 truth and 6/7 false.
Personally I will give it ZERO probability.
That is a tacit but clear admission that there is no objective fact supplying that probability. It's a cosmetic application of a random number chosen entirely because you like it. It undermines your entire argument.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Tue Jun 09, 2020 2:50 am Spectrum of theistic probability:
In The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins posits that "the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other."
He goes on to propose a continuous "spectrum of probabilities" between two extremes of opposite certainty, which can be represented by seven "milestones". Dawkins suggests definitive statements to summarize one's place along the spectrum of theistic probability. These "milestones" are:[2]

1. Strong theist. 100% probability of God. In the words of Carl Jung: "I do not believe, I know."
2. De facto theist. Very high probability but short of 100%. "I don't know for certain, but I strongly believe in God and live my life on the assumption that he is there."
3. eaning towards theism. Higher than 50% but not very high. "I am very uncertain, but I am inclined to believe in God."
4. Completely impartial. Exactly 50%. "God's existence and non-existence are exactly equiprobable."
5. Leaning towards atheism. Lower than 50% but not very low. "I do not know whether God exists but I'm inclined to be skeptical."
6. De facto atheist. Very low probability, but short of zero. "I don't know for certain but I think God is very improbable, and I live my life on the assumption that he is not there."
7. Strong atheist. "I know there is no God, with the same conviction as Jung knows there is one."

Dawkins argues that while there appear to be plenty of individuals that would place themselves as "1" due to the strictness of religious doctrine against doubt, most atheists do not consider themselves "7" because atheism arises from a lack of evidence and evidence can always change a thinking person's mind.

In print, Dawkins self-identified as a "6", though when interviewed by Bill Maher[3] and later by Anthony Kenny,[4] he suggested "6.9" to be more accurate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_ ... robability
Again, that has nothing to do with the actual probability of an entity existing, it is merely the application of a number as a placeholder for a description of person's personal beliefs.

I ask you again because you seem to have not noticed before.... is it your intention that discovery of some moral fact would show that a competing moral fact presented by somebody else is shown by your fact to be wrong?

What you are presenting doesn't work for that task, so you either have to become like Skepdick and assert 'facts' that are not necessarily held as true, if that's really what you want for this, or you need to dump this argument and work out something that gets you to where you are trying to actually go.
Veritas Aequitas
Posts: 12373
Joined: Wed Jul 11, 2012 4:41 am

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Veritas Aequitas »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Tue Jun 09, 2020 12:01 pm
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Tue Jun 09, 2020 2:50 am
FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Jun 08, 2020 11:35 am

Ok, so in Veritas's thing ... If one religion postulates that the world was created in 7 days, and some specific thing happens on the fith day while some other preceeds it on the fourth. That's been deemed a falsehood so it is only 3.55578% true according to whatever fun method is used to arrive at these highly convincing numbers.

A different religion claims the world was made all in one instant by 70 zillion fairies farting. For this religion we arrive at a falseness score of 7.8% true because the number is calculated randomly.

Eventually, after running through an arbitrary number of religious beliefs, all deemed absurd and false by somebody who claims no exclusive knowledge, and thus each have an arbitrary, cosmetically low probability, we end up at the scientific explanation with the big bang followed by the stuff that comes after that. There is 17% probability left over once all the other religions are taken into account.

Now it just so happens that according to the fossil record and the manner in which organisms are deemed to have evolved, the scientific consensus is that the event on the fifth day of that 7 days religion cannot be preceeded by that event on the fourth, and thus these competing explanations are mutually exclusive. And if the world were the instant creation of fairy butts, then this seems to exclude the possibility that the thing that came before the other thing could have done so or needed to to have done so irrespective of the explanation.

Mister Veritas seems to want it to be untrue that all of those explanations are simultaneously true. You, meh, not so much. But that's fine, the trap for Veritas here is that he runs the risk of becoming you, which seems an undesirable outcome. You of course, as always don't give a fuck about the subject under discussion because everything is just a means for you to excercise your obsessions.
The above are stupid examples and your strawman.

Note Richard Dawkins scale of belief in God exists.
Dawkins belief God exists with 1/7 probability, i.e. 1/7 truth and 6/7 false.
Personally I will give it ZERO probability.
That is a tacit but clear admission that there is no objective fact supplying that probability. It's a cosmetic application of a random number chosen entirely because you like it. It undermines your entire argument.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Tue Jun 09, 2020 2:50 am Spectrum of theistic probability:
In The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins posits that "the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other."
He goes on to propose a continuous "spectrum of probabilities" between two extremes of opposite certainty, which can be represented by seven "milestones". Dawkins suggests definitive statements to summarize one's place along the spectrum of theistic probability. These "milestones" are:[2]

1. Strong theist. 100% probability of God. In the words of Carl Jung: "I do not believe, I know."
2. De facto theist. Very high probability but short of 100%. "I don't know for certain, but I strongly believe in God and live my life on the assumption that he is there."
3. eaning towards theism. Higher than 50% but not very high. "I am very uncertain, but I am inclined to believe in God."
4. Completely impartial. Exactly 50%. "God's existence and non-existence are exactly equiprobable."
5. Leaning towards atheism. Lower than 50% but not very low. "I do not know whether God exists but I'm inclined to be skeptical."
6. De facto atheist. Very low probability, but short of zero. "I don't know for certain but I think God is very improbable, and I live my life on the assumption that he is not there."
7. Strong atheist. "I know there is no God, with the same conviction as Jung knows there is one."

Dawkins argues that while there appear to be plenty of individuals that would place themselves as "1" due to the strictness of religious doctrine against doubt, most atheists do not consider themselves "7" because atheism arises from a lack of evidence and evidence can always change a thinking person's mind.

In print, Dawkins self-identified as a "6", though when interviewed by Bill Maher[3] and later by Anthony Kenny,[4] he suggested "6.9" to be more accurate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_ ... robability
Again, that has nothing to do with the actual probability of an entity existing, it is merely the application of a number as a placeholder for a description of person's personal beliefs.

I ask you again because you seem to have not noticed before.... is it your intention that discovery of some moral fact would show that a competing moral fact presented by somebody else is shown by your fact to be wrong?

What you are presenting doesn't work for that task, so you either have to become like Skepdick and assert 'facts' that are not necessarily held as true, if that's really what you want for this, or you need to dump this argument and work out something that gets you to where you are trying to actually go.
You missed the point.

Note this point as quoted above;
  • In The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins posits that "the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other."
All established scientific facts starts with a hypothesis which is either
1. an opinion [<5%]
2. or belief [50%], i.e.
3. not yet knowledge [99.9%].
  • For example
    1. when Einstein first get a glimpse of his E =MC2 idea, that would be an opinion, a conjecture then and at that early stage, he did not know it will be a proven fact or a dud. As such this hypothesis can be rated 1% +/1 fact, i.e. not 99.99% fact.

    2. Then Einstein worked on his theory to arrive at the theoretical conclusion. Once he has his proof, it can only be a personal conviction, i.e. a belief. His theory would be verified by other scientists to confirm it is true. At this stage it can be his personal belief and those of others, i.e. a belief with 50% truth or 50% fact. At this stage of belief, no one can affirm that his theory is 99.99% fact but can be rated as a 50% fact.

    3. Thereafter when Einstein theory is tested, verified and confirm with empirical evidences that it is 99.99% true then, it is confirm as a 99.99% fact which is represented in empirical reality.
This is the same with how Dawkins granted the hypothesis 'God exists' a 1/7 probability or 0.1/7 probability subsequently of being able to be a 99.99% fact.

The above same process is applied to how I claimed for my moral facts.
If I had merely sounded the claim without justifications, that would be an opinion, i.e a 1% fact as there is no justification such a claim [state-of-affair] is represented in reality.

However I have done the necessary justifications and I am convinced my justifications are sound to qualify as a 50% fact as a personal belief.
I believe what I have claimed is represented by factual moral state-of-affairs as justified within a Framework and System of Morality and Ethics.
So far, no one has presented any convincing counter argument to show my claims are false.

I admit what I presented is not yet 99.99% fact at present, i.e. not tested fully and do not have sufficient intersubjective consensus yet like those recognized scientific facts.
Nevertheless, I believe I am not solid grounds because most of the evidences I provided are recognized scientific facts which I had combined and polished with critical philosophical reasonings. In addition, there is a community of philosophers who agree with what I am proposing.

Btw, I claim the facts [state-of-affair] you claimed as " real fact" are fundamentally illusions.
Do you think you can prove what you claim as facts are fundamentally real facts? Just me an example of how would you prove what you claim is fact is fundamentally real?
User avatar
Sculptor
Posts: 8535
Joined: Wed Jun 26, 2019 11:32 pm

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Sculptor »

Veritas Aequitas wrote: Sat Jun 06, 2020 7:43 am P2 Morality is managed via a specific Framework and System of Morality
C1 Therefore Moral facts exists as justified and derived from a specific Framework and System of Morality[/list]

From the above who would still insist there are not moral facts which are justified and derived from a specific Framework and System of Morality
P2 False
C1 you are a nutter.
Veritas Aequitas
Posts: 12373
Joined: Wed Jul 11, 2012 4:41 am

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Veritas Aequitas »

Sculptor wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 11:29 am
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Sat Jun 06, 2020 7:43 am P2 Morality is managed via a specific Framework and System of Morality
C1 Therefore Moral facts exists as justified and derived from a specific Framework and System of Morality[/list]

From the above who would still insist there are not moral facts which are justified and derived from a specific Framework and System of Morality
P2 False
C1 you are a nutter.
As usual, run out of rational arguments and counter, so resort to ad hominen.
User avatar
FlashDangerpants
Posts: 6268
Joined: Mon Jan 04, 2016 11:54 pm

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by FlashDangerpants »

Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am
FlashDangerpants wrote: Tue Jun 09, 2020 12:01 pm
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Tue Jun 09, 2020 2:50 am
The above are stupid examples and your strawman.

Note Richard Dawkins scale of belief in God exists.
Dawkins belief God exists with 1/7 probability, i.e. 1/7 truth and 6/7 false.
Personally I will give it ZERO probability.
That is a tacit but clear admission that there is no objective fact supplying that probability. It's a cosmetic application of a random number chosen entirely because you like it. It undermines your entire argument.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Tue Jun 09, 2020 2:50 am Spectrum of theistic probability:

Again, that has nothing to do with the actual probability of an entity existing, it is merely the application of a number as a placeholder for a description of person's personal beliefs.

I ask you again because you seem to have not noticed before.... is it your intention that discovery of some moral fact would show that a competing moral fact presented by somebody else is shown by your fact to be wrong?

What you are presenting doesn't work for that task, so you either have to become like Skepdick and assert 'facts' that are not necessarily held as true, if that's really what you want for this, or you need to dump this argument and work out something that gets you to where you are trying to actually go.
You missed the point.

Note this point as quoted above;
  • In The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins posits that "the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other."
All established scientific facts starts with a hypothesis which is either
1. an opinion [<5%]
2. or belief [50%], i.e.
3. not yet knowledge [99.9%].
  • For example
    1. when Einstein first get a glimpse of his E =MC2 idea, that would be an opinion, a conjecture then and at that early stage, he did not know it will be a proven fact or a dud. As such this hypothesis can be rated 1% +/1 fact, i.e. not 99.99% fact.

    2. Then Einstein worked on his theory to arrive at the theoretical conclusion. Once he has his proof, it can only be a personal conviction, i.e. a belief. His theory would be verified by other scientists to confirm it is true. At this stage it can be his personal belief and those of others, i.e. a belief with 50% truth or 50% fact. At this stage of belief, no one can affirm that his theory is 99.99% fact but can be rated as a 50% fact.

    3. Thereafter when Einstein theory is tested, verified and confirm with empirical evidences that it is 99.99% true then, it is confirm as a 99.99% fact which is represented in empirical reality.
So as I mentioned, those percentages you are assigning are cosmetic, they do not represent any actual percentage whatsoever, they are just a label you are applying to pretend you have mathematical backing for an evaluative - not remotely mathematical - judment you are making. If you were smarter, you would stop and think about why you are using this deception, and what missing piece of your method you are trying to cover up?

A hypothesis is a hypothesis, not a fact, not a percentage of a fact, it is the starting point of an investigation not a percentage of the conclusion.
The existence of God is not a scientific question at all, attempting to use science to answer such questions is an abuse of scientific method and only works when the target is a strawman fake God that nobody believes in or prays to.
I see no reason at all for you to bring Einstein into this, the 50% probability you assign is not derived from an actual calculation of any probability and is just cosmetic again.
None of your probabilities are actually that, they are all just made up. What you decide to label 99.99% probable could just as easily be labelled 97.54132% and I can state that mine is better than yours because it has more decimal places thus extra precision, it is irrelevant when there is nothing to claim precision in relation to.


Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am This is the same with how Dawkins granted the hypothesis 'God exists' a 1/7 probability or 0.1/7 probability subsequently of being able to be a 99.99% fact.
That only demonstrates that Dawkins is wrong in the same way you are.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am The above same process is applied to how I claimed for my moral facts.
No shit Sherlock. It is also wrong there.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am If I had merely sounded the claim without justifications, that would be an opinion, i.e a 1% fact as there is no justification such a claim [state-of-affair] is represented in reality.
Giving your own opinions 99.99% scores doesn't justify anything. Well except doubt about your abilities, it justifies the hell out of that.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am However I have done the necessary justifications and I am convinced my justifications are sound to qualify as a 50% fact as a personal belief.
I believe what I have claimed is represented by factual moral state-of-affairs as justified within a Framework and System of Morality and Ethics.
So far, no one has presented any convincing counter argument to show my claims are false.
That paragraph is packed with absurd mistakes. You are just so personally convinced that your belief is right that this becomes 50% fact is one of the worst things anyone has ever claimed on this forum.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am I admit what I presented is not yet 99.99% fact at present, i.e. not tested fully and do not have sufficient intersubjective consensus yet like those recognized scientific facts.
Nevertheless, I believe I am not solid grounds because most of the evidences I provided are recognized scientific facts which I had combined and polished with critical philosophical reasonings. In addition, there is a community of philosophers who agree with what I am proposing.
So you believe.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am Btw, I claim the facts [state-of-affair] you claimed as " real fact" are fundamentally illusions.
Do you think you can prove what you claim as facts are fundamentally real facts? Just me an example of how would you prove what you claim is fact is fundamentally real?
The distinction between realism and antirealism is just a matter of how to conceptualise the underlying fabric of all things. the important point is that nothing about the world as we live in it would be different either way. That means how we think about facts, how we describe the concept, none of that would change either. And that makes it a pointless diversion which you engage in when you have outwitted yourself. It is a scoping error, there is nothing riding on realism/antirealism, if you think it changes anything to do with any moral argument you have misunderstood something very fundamental.

You can try the same trick with one of the other irrelavent issues if you like. You can try and say that there has to moral fact because there is free will, or that there cannot be moral fact because there is no free will, just as you can claim that antirealism 'proves' either case. I'm going to show disdain for such things simply because those debates only relate to themselves, they have no bearing any other issue because the world would always be no different either way.


I ask you again because you seem to have not noticed before.... is it your intention that discovery of some moral fact would show that a competing moral fact presented by somebody else is shown by your fact to be wrong?
that question is getting so old I am close to forgetting why I asked it.
User avatar
Sculptor
Posts: 8535
Joined: Wed Jun 26, 2019 11:32 pm

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Sculptor »

Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 11:50 am
Sculptor wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 11:29 am
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Sat Jun 06, 2020 7:43 am P2 Morality is managed via a specific Framework and System of Morality
C1 Therefore Moral facts exists as justified and derived from a specific Framework and System of Morality[/list]

From the above who would still insist there are not moral facts which are justified and derived from a specific Framework and System of Morality
P2 False
C1 you are a nutter.
As usual, run out of rational arguments and counter, so resort to ad hominen.
You don't know what ad hominem means either.
Veritas Aequitas
Posts: 12373
Joined: Wed Jul 11, 2012 4:41 am

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Veritas Aequitas »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 2:16 pm
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am Note this point as quoted above;
  • In The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins posits that "the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other."
All established scientific facts starts with a hypothesis which is either
1. an opinion [<5%]
2. or belief [50%], i.e.
3. not yet knowledge [99.9%].
  • For example
    1. when Einstein first get a glimpse of his E =MC2 idea, that would be an opinion, a conjecture then and at that early stage, he did not know it will be a proven fact or a dud. As such this hypothesis can be rated 1% +/1 fact, i.e. not 99.99% fact.

    2. Then Einstein worked on his theory to arrive at the theoretical conclusion. Once he has his proof, it can only be a personal conviction, i.e. a belief. His theory would be verified by other scientists to confirm it is true. At this stage it can be his personal belief and those of others, i.e. a belief with 50% truth or 50% fact. At this stage of belief, no one can affirm that his theory is 99.99% fact but can be rated as a 50% fact.

    3. Thereafter when Einstein theory is tested, verified and confirm with empirical evidences that it is 99.99% true then, it is confirm as a 99.99% fact which is represented in empirical reality.
So as I mentioned, those percentages you are assigning are cosmetic, they do not represent any actual percentage whatsoever, they are just a label you are applying to pretend you have mathematical backing for an evaluative - not remotely mathematical - judment you are making. If you were smarter, you would stop and think about why you are using this deception, and what missing piece of your method you are trying to cover up?

A hypothesis is a hypothesis, not a fact, not a percentage of a fact, it is the starting point of an investigation not a percentage of the conclusion.
The existence of God is not a scientific question at all, attempting to use science to answer such questions is an abuse of scientific method and only works when the target is a strawman fake God that nobody believes in or prays to.

I see no reason at all for you to bring Einstein into this, the 50% probability you assign is not derived from an actual calculation of any probability and is just cosmetic again.
None of your probabilities are actually that, they are all just made up. What you decide to label 99.99% probable could just as easily be labelled 97.54132% and I can state that mine is better than yours because it has more decimal places thus extra precision, it is irrelevant when there is nothing to claim precision in relation to.
You cannot deny the following;
99.99% black is 0.01% white.
and the other combinations.
Thus 99.99 true is 0.01 falsehood.

If we are to study the actual phases of how Einstein's E=MC2 was confirmed from hypothesis to recognized theory, we will be able to detect the above % from opinion to belief to knowledge.

I rated 99.99% because there is no such thing as 100% perfection.
You can rate what you claim as knowledge at 97.54132, what counts is the basis of justifications you provide which can be tested or verified by others.
If you claim, the Sun is 93 million miles from Earth as a fact as 97.54132% fact, that is still acceptable as a fact because there is no absolute distance between the Sun and the Earth.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am This is the same with how Dawkins granted the hypothesis 'God exists' a 1/7 probability or 0.1/7 probability subsequently of being able to be a 99.99% fact.
That only demonstrates that Dawkins is wrong in the same way you are.
Dawkins claimed his approach as "a scientific hypothesis like any other."
That is how Science proceed to verify the existing of the existence of things.
Dawkins is a scientist and you are judging he is not?
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am The above same process is applied to how I claimed for my moral facts.
No shit Sherlock. It is also wrong there.
A merely exclamation is not sufficient to support your point.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am If I had merely sounded the claim without justifications, that would be an opinion, i.e a 1% fact as there is no justification such a claim [state-of-affair] is represented in reality.
Giving your own opinions 99.99% scores doesn't justify anything. Well except doubt about your abilities, it justifies the hell out of that.
Note when Einstein's initial opinion re E=MC2 reached the 99.99% score it was recognized as as a fact.
Obviously when I claimed 99.99% it will be accompanied with the necessary justifications.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am However I have done the necessary justifications and I am convinced my justifications are sound to qualify as a 50% fact as a personal belief.
I believe what I have claimed is represented by factual moral state-of-affairs as justified within a Framework and System of Morality and Ethics.
So far, no one has presented any convincing counter argument to show my claims are false.
That paragraph is packed with absurd mistakes. You are just so personally convinced that your belief is right that this becomes 50% fact is one of the worst things anyone has ever claimed on this forum.
Note I have presented my arguments in the other thread.

What could make morality objective?
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=24601

How can you say it is a mistake when you have not countered my arguments convincingly?
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am I admit what I presented is not yet 99.99% fact at present, i.e. not tested fully and do not have sufficient intersubjective consensus yet like those recognized scientific facts.
Nevertheless, I believe I [s]am not[/s] [have] solid grounds because most of the evidences I provided are recognized scientific facts which I had combined and polished with critical philosophical reasonings. In addition, there is a community of philosophers who agree with what I am proposing.
So you believe.
Yes, based on the evidence and argument provided in the other thread.
Veritas Aequitas wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 6:15 am Btw, I claim the facts [state-of-affair] you claimed as " real fact" are fundamentally illusions.
Do you think you can prove what you claim as facts are fundamentally real facts? Just me an example of how would you prove what you claim is fact is fundamentally real?
The distinction between realism and antirealism is just a matter of how to conceptualise the underlying fabric of all things. the important point is that nothing about the world as we live in it would be different either way. That means how we think about facts, how we describe the concept, none of that would change either. And that makes it a pointless diversion which you engage in when you have outwitted yourself. It is a scoping error, there is nothing riding on realism/antirealism, if you think it changes anything to do with any moral argument you have misunderstood something very fundamental.

You can try the same trick with one of the other irrelavent issues if you like. You can try and say that there has to moral fact because there is free will, or that there cannot be moral fact because there is no free will, just as you can claim that antirealism 'proves' either case. I'm going to show disdain for such things simply because those debates only relate to themselves, they have no bearing any other issue because the world would always be no different either way.
You are ignorant of what the Philosophical Realism versus Philosophical anti-Realism entails, which I had explained in another post.

I ask you again because you seem to have not noticed before.... is it your intention that discovery of some moral fact would show that a competing moral fact presented by somebody else is shown by your fact to be wrong?
that question is getting so old I am close to forgetting why I asked it.
The contention by Peter, Sculptor and you is, there are no objective moral fact at all because what is fact to you cannot be evaluative into moral elements. The reason is you all are stuck dogmatically with Hume's guillotine, i.e. no ought from is and fact is never value.

I do not agree and insist there are relative objective moral facts that can be justified from empirical evidences and philosophical reasoning, to be used as GUIDES within a Framework and System of Morality and Ethics.

The point if one starts from what is morality-proper, the first thing to do is to established objective ground, i.e. relative objective moral facts to ground the moral system, else it will be a rudderless system.
Skepdick
Posts: 14366
Joined: Fri Jun 14, 2019 11:16 am

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by Skepdick »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Wed Jun 10, 2020 2:16 pm The distinction between realism and antirealism is just a matter of how to conceptualise the underlying fabric of all things. the important point is that nothing about the world as we live in it would be different either way. That means how we think about facts, how we describe the concept, none of that would change either. And that makes it a pointless diversion which you engage in when you have outwitted yourself. It is a scoping error, there is nothing riding on realism/antirealism, if you think it changes anything to do with any moral argument you have misunderstood something very fundamental.

You can try the same trick with one of the other irrelavent issues if you like. You can try and say that there has to moral fact because there is free will, or that there cannot be moral fact because there is no free will, just as you can claim that antirealism 'proves' either case. I'm going to show disdain for such things simply because those debates only relate to themselves, they have no bearing any other issue because the world would always be no different either way.
Why do you avoid going for your own sacred cows every time you think you are making a point?

Nothing about reality rests upon human descriptions or conceptions of it.

There's nothing riding on truth or falsity.
There is nothing riding on humans successfully conceptualising ALL or ANY of reality.

I am going to show disdain for your disdain because your debates relate to nothing of relevance or importance whatsoever if nothing we ever say or do makes any difference. Reality today is exactly the same as reality 10000 years ago.

Therefore all philosophy/science/medicine/engineering are all pointless diversions - might as well put an end to it all tomorrow. Society attempting to do anything whatsoever is a pointless diversion. Reality doesn't give a shit whether humans understand it or not because the world would be no different either way.
User avatar
FlashDangerpants
Posts: 6268
Joined: Mon Jan 04, 2016 11:54 pm

Re: What is a Fact?

Post by FlashDangerpants »

Veritas Aequitas wrote: Thu Jun 11, 2020 10:06 am You cannot deny the following;
99.99% black is 0.01% white.
and the other combinations.
Thus 99.99 true is 0.01 falsehood.
Yes I can, it's definitely wrong. Which sort of wrong is a matter of understanding how you are framing your example though.

I wouldn't contest that the albedo of a surface could be measured using calibrated equipment and certified as 99.99% non reflective with a remainder of 0.01% reflected, and I am not in the optical sciences, but if the reflected light is spread out equally across the visible spectrum then we can allow whiteness. That doesn't create a 0.01% falsehood though. What results from that measurement is a factual statement, there is no percentage of truth just because there is a percentage of reflection.

If on the other hand your measuring device is humans and their opinions about the blackness or whiteness of an object, somebody is just plain wrong there. Not some fake percentage of wrong, they are entirely wrong. If the shade of the surface is sort of somewhere between grey and black, something oblique enough that not everyone agrees it is black, then any assertion of white is 100% nonsense.

If lighting conditions make it impossible to tell whether some object is black or white, the experiment is generating unreliable data and there is no basis to assert any probability at all in that circumstance.

There are colours which normal people don't always agree on, with some shades that look brown to one viewer but are clearly orange as far as some other is concerned. In those cases, it is quite probable that some authority has assigned colours not by visual inspection, but rather by assigning certain wavelength boundaries between the official colours. From the perspective of that official framework, it is entirely possible to say "that is orange and Pantone agree with me so it is an offical fact". The other person can even agree with this and opt to abide by Pantone's ruling, yet they still see that colour as brown, and their assent to a convention that this is not what the colour is, doesn't change that, nor does it really make them wrong. Our concepts of seeing-as are unaffected by this, and the concept of probability is irrelevant here in any case.

You can have a picture of a dress where people see-as radically different colours to each other (black and gold vs blue and something, we all know the photo I am half-remembering). In that case, it's totally cool either way, you can describe it as each pairing according to what you see in that photo, and under different conditions you see it as the other and thus describe it as the other. I don't actually care whether people decide the matter by saying one view is wrong because if you look at it under normal conditions everyone agrees it is red and yellow. Or they can use one of the other resolution strategies, the seeing-as happened the way it did at the time, and the seeing-as can happen a different way at some other time.

Much more importantly, there is a strong connection between the science of optics and the way we do actually see, we can allow for that science to resolve disputes over colour and shade because it so well tracks our experiences, so if people want to agree there is a true colour of something, that is completely legitimate even though it is a truth by convention, not an external objective fact. Totally measurable features of light and eyeballs directly determine how we see stuff.

The science of morality you propose has no chance of doing the same. We can all agree on some very basic stuff, everybody understands that unequal division is unfair if there are no other factors. If you tell a moral story about 3 children divvying up a basket of apples and all the children get the same number of apples, that is intuitively fair, and if one child gets all the apples but the others get none, that is intuitively unfair, as long as there are no reasons to explain any of that. But if you could actually build a true and indisputable moral framework from such elements, it would have happened already, and it defintitely hasn't been done. There is, as I already aknowledged somewhere, at least some biological element in morality, it is necessary for our brains to be wired up in such a way that we can percieve the basic ingredients from which the cake is baked - equity, loyalty, empathy and so on. There is something for you to get some facts about in all of that, but you will still be prevented from proceeding to generate moral truths that go beyond banal tautology even if you put in a bit more effort and get better facts than those you are wielding in your clumsy arguments in other threads.

The problem is that morality will still boil down to subjectivity becasue it is all about the seeing-as within that inescapable framework of evolved biological stuff (becasue evolution is unplanned you see), and there are too many occasions where something can be seen by one person as a duty, but by another as disloyalty. You cannot distil morality down to a single variable in the way you can with light, and in any case you cannot measure the variables at all, they have no physical propoerties to measure, applying stupid made up percentages to them is no substitute. If you try to define an action as 99.99% charity 0.01% selfishness you will be making zero sense still.
Post Reply